(a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cruise control system and a method thereof. Particularly, the present invention relates to a cruise control system and a method thereof for calculating an environmentally-friendly/economical drive speed while allowing cruise control.
(b) Description of the Related Art
A cruise control system allows a vehicle to run at a predetermined uniform speed when a driver starts a cruise control device at a specific speed. The system can reduce the driver's drive fatigue, but it does not provide safety and an environmentally-friendly and economical driving method because of driving patterns of other vehicles.
A safety component is added to the conventional cruise control system to generate an adaptive (or smart) cruise control system. The smart cruise control system adjusts the vehicle's speed to maintain a regular distance with a preceding vehicle in order to prevent a collision with it when it changes drive lanes or speed, and the system controls the vehicle to run at a steady speed when the distance is obtained.
However, since this skill allows a steady drive only based on the speed established by the driver, it has a problem of failing to provide environmentally-friendly and economical driving.
The above information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the invention and therefore it may contain information that does not form the prior art that is already known in this country to a person of ordinary skill in the art.